Open Exploring on The Nile

Ushahidi has helped our friends and fellow conspirators, OpenROV, make their dream of open exploration possible by building OpenExplorer.com using the Crowdmap API. It is an incredible project, something we are super excited about as a team both because of the technical things achieved in the site but also because of the bigger vision, to open up exploration to any one.

Last week I was able to go on a BRCK expedition, something we do as a company to be able to test the BRCK in the field and learn about what is needed, what works, and what doesn’t. We used Open Explorer to document this trip, and it was awesome. We used the site to share the story of our adventures, learnings, and outcomes to our team and community around the world. It was fulfilling to be using one tool we helped create while out in the field testing another one we have built; synchronicity.

We even used one of OpenROV’s underwater robots in Lake Victoria and in the Nile, and made it wireless through a BRCK.

So after a week setting up BRCKs in schools on islands in Lake Victoria, and rafting down the Nile, and playing with underwater robots, here is the story of the trip through Open Explorer. I highly recommend testing this one out.